England vs Pakistan just starting. Because of time zone shenanigans and my work schedule, these England home tests end up being spectacularly well timed for me to watch at/after work.
I’m a devout member of the church of Steve Smith and his prophet Marnus Labuschangne/Loosebuschange.
God I love me some cricket. Been playing the shit out of my cricket 19 career mode since i got it for the switch.
Oh shit, a cricket game that’s actually good? Is that possible? If it’s good and on switch I might have to give it a go
Yeah, the difficulty takes a while and the loading times are a bit silly but I've enjoyed it so far
Thought I'd put it on when I wake up. By that time it was already raining. lol. But I caught the Ireland match the day before. It was incredible. Almost to the last ball. So glad they won.
Same! I was so excited to finish work and sit with a few beers and watch late into the night, by the time I got home it was raining, lol. What a weird series that Ireland England ODI one was, a blowout win and then closer contest afterwards.
hightlights of england Pakistan day 2
Man those Pakistani quicks can bowl! It’s amazing the quality of attacks across test cricket right now. Absolute jaffa to remove stokes, england might need that Manchester rain to come back over the next three days to save this test.
Cricket is odd - I totally understand how people don’t enjoy it, but honestly, once you know what’s going on, and understand the flow of a match and how the pressure and narrative of a match can build over time, it’s such an incredible game.
The balance of “incredible moments” to “intense passages of play” to “lulls” is amazing in cricket. It’s almost like the classical music of sport? It goes for far longer than a standard pop song, goes through tempo changes, reaches crescendos, and is kind of hard to get into and obtuse.
It’s such a great game though. And a game of real skill, too. I really feel like anyone who likes baseball could easily understand and enjoy cricket if they give it a chance. ___
I'm sold. What's a good video to watch to understand the rules, and what's a good match to watch to see it in action
Haha, awesome. here’s a quick primer that should give you enough grasp of the rules to get started, and here’s the highlights of the World Cup final from last year, regarded as one of the most exciting games in years.
After that maybe give this a go. It’s the final day highlights of a test match between England and Australia that ended on the 4th (of a potential 5) day. Australia needed to get all england’s guys out to win the game, and win “the ashes” which is a trophy england and Australia play a five match series (so 25 days of cricket) for every 18 months, and had two days to do it. England’s all-rounder (a guy who is good at batting and bowling, not a specialist) Ben Stokes scores 135 runs to win the game, including batting for a 77 run partnership at the end with England’s “number 11”, the last batsman in the order (generally the further down the order you go the worse the batsmen are, you send out your batting specialists first and then the bowlers who are half decent at batting, and then the absolutely terrible batters). You could read this article to get some more context!
There’s also random stuff on YouTube like videos of the greatest ever catches.
The one problem with watching highlights is you miss out on the passages of play where batsmen aren’t scoring any runs and the bowlers are bowling well and the pressure is building, obviously by its very nature highlights tend to show wickets and boundaries. Next time you have a chance to watch a game live on tv give it a chance!
I hope this is the start of a new enjoyment of cricket for you :P
Cricket is doing baseball slightly differently, faster, and many more times over the course of, like, three days. Also, like baseball, you can read the rules or have it explained, but it won’t help - you just gotta chill and watch a whole bunch.
